It has long been known that a pond is a key element in a garden for those who are serious about attracting and supporting wildlife.
Whilst the pond is relatively small – a little bit smaller than the average bath – it very quickly attracted a range of wildlife and is now home to a group of frogs and other assorted water flies and water boatman.
As with any small pond birds also make good use of it for both drinking and bathing.
As this is quite a small pond we have been careful to manage it to ensure that not too much debris builds up in the bottom of the pond. With the cherry tree adjacent to the pond and a considerable number of deciduous plants dropping their leaves into the pond we try to remove as many as we can. On average about every 5-6 years we will undertake a major clean out and lift the waterlily and any other plants and “dredge” the bottom of the pond – usually in early winter to minimise disruption to any water creatures and giving the pond enough time to settle before the frogs spawn.
The pond was installed in 2009 and so far we have not had to re-line it, although we suspect there might be a small hole as the water level did drop quite quickly during the summer of 2022, although that was a particularly warm summer so that will. not have helped!
When the pond was installed we ensured that there was an overflow outlet – which is a small dip in the back edge under the mini-gabions that we have installed which can be seen in one of the pictures above. We have since added some additional ones at the end of the pond as part of the revamp of the area when we installed the pergola. These are just visible in the bottom of the picture below.
An Experimental Garden 